Five Traits of Indecisive People

Usually I'm not a big fan of pop psychology. If I am stuck in a waiting room, I might pick a magazine article on why introverts make effective leaders over one that tells which new car models are big in Europe or what a Hollywood celebrity was seen wearing when spotted in New York, but with those few exceptions, I'm not too interested in data that has been collated by a psychology grad student to reaffirm what a thinking person assumes is common sense.

But...

But I came across a listing of five traits of indecisive people and ... well, I think KatieLyn must have submitted her questionnaire to this grad student's study. If we use a baseball analogy, she knocks it out of the park on four of them, and still scores with a bunt on the other one.  Here's the list:

1.  Indecisive people have parents, usually the mother, who never allowed them to make decisions.
In the parents' desire to guard their child from getting hurt, they cripple them instead. What few choices the child has been allowed to exercise are usually limited safe ones that keep him from finding his limits and strengths on his own.

2. Indecisive people are insecure.
People who are immobilized by insecurity might make a visceral decision at first, but they have trouble sticking with it when their self-doubt starts to question and second-guess that choice. Their head won't trust their heart, or much of anything else

3. Indecisive people are people pleasers.
Sorting out one's own evanescent feelings is tough enough, but those who are impelled to please and appease the passing persuasions and passions of other people, (all alteration aside,) are puzzled and perplexed.

4. Indecisive people don't want the work involved.
People waver over the big decisions when they become frazzled over having to make all the little ones that go along with it and following them through to their conclusion. They may be wishy-washy because they are lazy or because they are simply overwhelmed by the task; either way, they are hesitant because of the work.

5. Indecisive people are afraid of the consequences and the shame of being wrong.
People who sit astraddle the fence often fall off in the end. Their fear of making the wrong choice almost assures that they will falter.

The above listing of five traits works with the secular psychology taught in universities. The poster to the left side here is straight from the fantasy genre of fiction.  Neither directly support the mission statement of this blog— to compare real life with scripture; yet all express the wisdom of their intellectual province.  Each one is an ingredient in the complex mixture that sent KatieLyn bolting off on the middle of the night. And each one is a reflection of a concept that can be supported in scripture.

1. Parents can stiffle a child's growth.  This was covered on my September 24th post called Smothering Mothering. The example used there was that of Rebekah, whose son Jacob was not able to come into his destiny until after she was removed from his life. Of course, we don't want it to get that bad for KatieLyn!  But one of her unintended consequences of calling off the wedding was that she also removed herself from God's provision to overcome the codependency with her mother.

2. There are many Bible verses that I could have chosen to illustrate the importance of knowing who you are in Christ as a way of overcoming insecurity. There are many Bible characters who had to overcome insecurity to fulfill their mission; Gideon, Moses, Esther, Elijah, Timothy, just to name a few. But the verse that I keep coming back to is John 8:32, "And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." Knowing the truth allows you to think as a realist. It gives you confidence. An example is Elisha's servant who got up one morning to see an army with horses and chariots circling the city. Fearful of his future, he asked Elisha what they should do. "Then Elisha prayed and said, "O LORD, I pray, open his eyes that he may see." And the LORD opened the servant's eyes and he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha." 2 Kings 6:17. In the previous post, "Which thou knowest not," I wrote about how the truth is often hidden for a reason and that God expects us to dig it out.

3. It's not so much that pleasing people is wrong, but that it can so easily become unbalanced, especially when there is an overlay of insecurity. In 1 Corinthians 10:33, Paul admits, "I try to please everyone in every way," but he does this with the purpose of their salvation and not seeking to look good for his own advantage.  It is one of the passages where scoffers say the the Bible is full of contradictions because in Galatians 1:10 he writes, "If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a servant of Christ." There has to be a sorting of priorities; and pleasing God, which is a higher priority, does not always exclude pleasing men. Joe did not want KatieLyn to please him before she pleased God, but he did want her to please God before she pleased her mother.

4. I believe that when KatieLyn looked at the task of setting up her own household away from her parents, that she was more overwhelmed by the size of the endeavor than it was laziness. It is usually easier to overcome the feeling of dismay than to correct the sin of sloth. Either way though, the outcome of Proverbs 18:9 remains the same: "One who is slack in his work is a brother to him who destroys."  The use of the term "brother" means that they have a lot in common. Not being willing to work on a marriage is just about the same as destroying it. 

5. I'm pretty sure that Gwen would have a conniption over my response to making the wrong decision, which is: It's better than nothing! But that is her personal issue. Indecisive people usually are afraid of the consequences of being wrong; but usually trying is better than doing nothing. Wizard's First Rule is sort of a middling book, good but not great, however, its characters do have moments of great insight. The quote on the poster illustrates one of them. If you do not move forward, you will never get to the next level. 

The Lesson
There is a lot to be said for the courage to go forward. It takes more courage to go forward than to call it quits. There is no good way to get around Hebrews 10:38, a verse this blog has quoted previously, "Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him." God is the speaker here, as the writer is referencing Habakkuk 2:4. The righteous should live by continued confidence in God. And again, in Romans 1:17, "For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith." The revealing is from faith to faith; never flowing backwards, not standing stagnant, but from one step of faith to the next, moment by moment.

Some may try to argue that KatieLyn's decision to call off the wedding and run home in the middle of the night was a real decision. I don't see it that way because she has never provided an authentic reason for her behavior. It was not a decision so much as it was a retreat.